Sony’s been talking about how they’ve overtaken the Xbox 360 here in the States, perhaps this is because Microsoft shifted their attention to pwning them in Japan? Xbox 360 sold 25,000 units to PlayStation 3‘s minor 9,673 units according to Edge Online, that’s 2.5 times more if you’re into that math thing.
Seriously though, Microsoft didn’t really shift any effort, they just got a Japanese style game called Tales of Vesperia from Namco Bandai. Go figure, when a Japanese focused game arrives for a console Japanese gamer will go out and buy it.
The big barrier to the 360 in Japan is the games and their contents. Microsoft is in tune with the needs and demands of the United States gamers, it usually involves FPS titles and excessive killing. Japanese gamers are not exactly huge FPS fans, we’ve seen the Asian community dominate in RTS style games (Starcraft is a great example) and they’ve always had interest in MMO’s, especially micro-transaction based games and we all know that’s the land of Final Fantasy. Is it so surprising the Xbox 360 moves off Japanese shelves when they have a game or two the gamers actually want to play?
This is only partly Microsoft’s fault, Microsoft doesn’t specialize in Japanese games anymore than Square Enix excels at western style games. The big difference? Square Enix doesn’t manufacturer its own console hardware. It is Microsoft’s console and they should have an interest in making games the Japanese people will like, thankfully Namco Bandai came through for them this time!
@Duke Nukem Forever review fiasco:
This one is almost ‘no comment’. The nasty side is what Jordan said (except foe Jonah I can’t yet distinguish your voices, sorry if I mix you up): they don’t mind blacklisting, they just don’t want it to be public.
@ Apple will be the games industry in 10 years:
You can even devise a control scheme for touch based interfaces, but!
Just like console controllers, a mouse and keyboard using player will best one using a console controller, in competitive gaming.
Jonah, I’m with you on the real books vs. kindle. Don’t get me wrong guys, that’s a device that I like, but it doesn’t hold a kandle 😛 to a real book.
@ No need for PS4, PS3 now hitting its stride:
Erm, hello, PS3 is hacked? Piracy will be as rampant on PS3 as is on PC? PS3 might become a very unattractive platform to develop for? (hard to code for it and with it’s DRM system exposed for all to pirate your product).
😀 Jonah, thanks for pointing out misspellings, it’s useful to me.
@Question of the Week:
I do care what it says in the review. I do want to read if a certain aspect is flawed: perhaps it is a feature that interests me, and in that case I’ll skip the game.
As for the score versus the entire contents, well, it actually depends on the value of the score.
If it’s below 5, then I don’t even bother to read the review. The score weights 100%.
If it’s up until 7, the score weights 50%. Above 7, it’s really up to the contents of the review, not the score: weight drops to almost 0%.
Just to let you know that things in Australia aren’t that bad. If one looks around abit you can get a good deal on games even if they are brand new. Granted prices have been $110 for some games but with some skill you can get it imported from the UK with shipping for nearly half the price. I havn’t brought a game from a major Australian retailer for some time now. Feel sorry for those who do ouch.